Jonah’s Friday Feature Artist Interview can be found at the bottom of this page.
Nature presents itself in a kaleidoscope of organic shapes and structures. For sculptor Jonah Jacobs, who is inspired by anything from hiking in the woods near his home in Ohio, to galaxies far away and NASA's planet and space images, you never know where and how these influences may resurface.
With a love of holes, dirt, decaying trees, slime, muck, rocks and anything with texture, Jonah wants to know how things are built, not just to appreciate what they look like, but to understand the physicality of how form and function are intertwined in nature.
As a self-taught sculptor, Jonah has been experimenting with materiality and colour using what he can find and distort for many years, driven by the challenge of seeing just how far you can push unconventional and upcycled materials through deconstructing, burning, ripping and staining. Oatmeal, sand and plaster give Jonah's work a textural quality, with the porous surface soaking up colourful dyes to produce a wondrous vibrancy and blending of tones.
Describing himself as a ‘Material Alchemist’, Jonah blends art and science. Inspired by nature's endless mystery, he uses unpredictable elements to give his detailed sculptures a life of their own.
Artistic Beginnings
When asked about himself, Jonah explains that he has “a lot of weird contradictions in my life”.
“If you went back maybe 25 years ago and asked me if I was going to be an artist, I probably would have said, ‘There's no way’. I was born in Denmark. At 18, I joined the military so I was actually in the 82nd Airborne Division and used to jump out of planes! Then after that, I went to a Liberal Arts college in Antioch, Ohio. My degree was in philosophy. Some people say you can see that in my art, which I think is kind of interesting. Then I got a job in mental health, which is what I do for my day to day job. So it's been a weird journey to becoming an artist. I really didn't start until my mid-30s. So I've been doing it for about 20 years now.”
Jonah’s art has abstract qualities and it’s hard to even know what materials he has used.
“For one thing, I like the structure of lichen, and I’m also fascinated by rust,” he explains. “I grew up hearing about rust all the time and I have been experimenting with using rust slurry as dye. I’ve been playing around creating natural dyes as well, using the tree in my backyard. And I’m also fascinated by holes, for example the insides of a decaying tree.”
Breading and Burning
Jonah brings ‘chef skills’ to his 3D sculptures, using oatmeal and fibre dyes to evoke the look of the natural world and present that lichen-like feel.
“When you’re looking at my work, you’re almost always seeing oatmeal. I started by using table salt, which worked well, then I switched to Epsom salts, which has a tendency to decay. I needed something that was cheap so I could cover large pieces. I tried salt, experimented with sawdust but the neutral colour of oatmeal worked because it could also be dyed.”
“I turn it into a flour to ‘bread’ my work. The majority of my sculptures are often made from layers of cardboard that are rolled and glued together as well. I’ll burn the ends to get an organic shape, so it doesn’t look too geometric.”
Jonah describes fire sculpting, saying “In a way, the wind will imprint itself on my sculpture. You can tell if it has been a windy day because you will see jagged edges. I burn it, then scrape the charred material off and realise what it looks like underneath.”
“I tend to be an analytical person so not having complete control of the process allows me to let go and let nature take over,” Jonah explains.
Nature as Inspiration
“When you’re in the military, you’re in the middle of nowhere a lot of the time,” Jonah explains. “You’re not always busy so you’re taking it all in, which is what I miss about the military; going to environments like Panama, Korea, everywhere.”
“In museums, you see perfect landscape paintings but they can be too perfect. I’m more obsessed with what’s decaying and broken… the structure of nature and things like bark and mushrooms and how they are put together and then replicated.”
“Plants are all competing for nutrients, they're all competing for the sun. So an older tree will block out the light for new areas. And then when it dies, then you get this surge of new growth that comes. So those plants, you know that those beautiful flowers, you see, they're actually trying to outcompete their neighbours. Sometimes in my works, I try to imagine how like the little clusters of a little brown here, a little greener here, is actually a grouping of similar organisms that are trying to out-compete their neighbours. For me, at least there's like a hidden tension in my work that maybe other people don't realise.”
Jonah’s art can come across as so realistic that it often confuses people; they’re not sure if they’re looking at art or nature when they come across his works. To play up to this, he takes his artwork out into nature and puts it in interesting places to blur the boundaries between nature and art. “When you take art out of a gallery or museum, kids come up and they’re so in awe and they love it, because they haven’t had contact with something like that.”
Removing Object Permanence
To try to reduce waste, Jonah will put a piece in a show and then “chop it up, so it becomes a different sculpture. Sometimes I pretend like they’re continuing to grow, or almost being grafted to sprout a new piece.” As a result of this, Jonah’s work is never done; it thrives through growing and evolving ‘colonies’ which transform to match the space they will be shown in.
“Sometimes I’ll turn a vertical piece into a horizontal piece, or decide to firesculpt or grind it, which is always an option. What’s nice about what I do is I can always start all over again.”
Jonah's works often become part of the environment themselves, moving to ‘live’ outdoors. “I’ve been wanting to do a whole series, encasing sculptures in mud and clay, burying them and seeing what happens and if that part of nature can be harnessed to actually sculpt the materials I use. I like the idea of a slow process and even two and a half years of decay. There’s something to be said for letting go and not having to see what it will look like tomorrow.”
Finding Inspiration
Art “can feel intimidating for people,” Jonah says. “They feel like either they're not good at it, or I have a lot of people who say, ‘Oh, I wish I could do what you do’. They'll say, ‘I drew a little bit and I'm not good at it’ Well, you did it for an hour; it takes a long time. But I feel like a lot of the boundaries are breaking down between interdisciplinary art, and allowing people to express themselves in whatever material they feel that they want to.”
As for advice… “I would say, experiment, experiment, experiment, don't be afraid. I feel like I got lucky because I'm self-taught. I think if I had gone to school, there was about zero chance that I would have happened on oatmeal and cardboard, it probably would have been frowned on. My advice is to stay hungry. Look at as much art as you can. And just don't be afraid to try things. I mean, everything that you see in almost all my work is stuff that you can find around the house. Most of it is just material that gets thrown in the trash. If you push those boundaries, and really just are open to learning; learn, learn, learn and experiment.”
Jonah has been asked to take part in a lot of projects, including for hospitals. “A lot of people say my art makes them feel joy and happiness,” he explains, “If I can make them feel calmer, I’m all for that.”